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Page 4A • The Monitor - Thursday, October 18, 2012East Texas Arboretum holds annual fall fest1. 4”Monitor staff/Linda K. HoltTrinity Valley Community College student and outdoor performer MichaelYates comes to the annual fall festival at the East Texas Arboretum inAthens as The Roadrunner, a body puppet. He stands with puppet creatorSamantha Pettigrew Saturday prior to their performance of tall tales.Children of all ages were entertained by their stories. See the Sundayedition of The Monitor for more photos and coverage of the all-day event.Troup man gets 25 yearson tampering, fraud chargesNew web tool keepstaxpayers informedSpecial to The MonitorAUSTIN-Thousandsof cities, counties, specialpurpose districts and tran-sit authorities in Texas levyproperty or sales tax, andtaxpayers may not beaware of the various taxentities they are paying.Texas Comptroller Su-san Combs announcedthat for the first time Tex-ans can get a more com-plete picture of local taxeslevied in every countythrough a newly devel-oped web tool.With the click of amouse, every citizen inTexas can now see who iscollecting property taxesand sales taxes in theircounty, along with thevalue of those local taxes.“Taxpayers deserve toknow who’s in their wal-lets,” Combs said.“Texans should knowwho is taxing them on thelocal level, how they arebeing taxed and wheretheir tax dollars are beingspent. Our new web toolhelps them to becomemore engaged in govern-ment and make more in-formed decisions to holdtheir elected officials ac-countable,” she added.This new resource,available atwww. TexasTransparency. org,includes interactive mapsproviding a close-up viewof the local entities that as-sess property and salestaxes in each of Texas’ 254counties.Combs also released areport entitled YourMoney and the TaxingFacts that provides con-text for the web tool, in-cluding trends in localtaxation. The report alsoproposes several recom-mendations to increasetransparency for localtaxation and offers tips toresidents in exercising theirrights as taxpayers.During the past two de-cades, hundreds of prop-erty and sales taxing dis-tricts have been created (inaddition to cities, countiesand school districts) to fi-nance services as diverseas crime control, ground-water, libraries, emergencyservices, utility infrastruc-ture and hospitals. Thesespecial purpose districtsare growing in number ev-ery year, collecting taxes tosupport operations;oftentimes taxpayers maynot be fully aware of howmuch and to whom theyare paying.“More transparency iscritical to individual Texansas they consider tax bur-dens,” Combs said. “Be-cause so many differentlocal entities have taxingauthorities, finding all ofthat information in oneplace can be challenging. Iwant to change that,” sheadded.This report is the first ina series of reports entitledTexas, It’s Your Moneyaimed to help taxpayersknow more about all theways their wallets are im-pacted. Taxpayers canfind the report and followthe series atwww. Texaslts YourMoney. org.Here are the notabletypes of local taxing enti-ties:• Cities - Incorporatedcities in Texas, includingmunicipalities, towns andvillages, may impose aproperty tax and a salestax.• Counties - Texascounties may impose aproperty tax. To impose asales tax, the property taxrate must be reduced.• School Districts - Ev-ery public school district inTexas levies a property taxon taxable property withinits boundaries to generatethe locally funded portionof its operating revenueand debt service.• Special Purpose Dis-tricts - Taxing entities cre-ated to generate revenuefor specific reasons, in-cluding utilities, crime con-trol, emergency services orlibraries. Depending on thepurpose, these districtsmay impose a property taxand/or a sales tax.• Transit Authorities -Transit authorities in Texasmay impose a sales tax.Transit authorities includejurisdictions such as met-ropolitan transit authori-ties, city transit depart-ments, county transit au-thorities and advancedtransportation districts.Special to The MonitorATHENS-MichaelShane Haskins, 43, ofTroup was sentenced to25 years in prison Mondayfor charges of Tamperingwith a Government Docu-ment and Fraudulent Useor Possession of Identify-ing Information. Haskinswas prosecuted by Assis-tant District AttorneyBridget Bateman. JudgeMark Calhoon of the 3rdJudicial District Court im-posed the sentence afterHaskins pled guilty to theoffenses.Haskins was indicted bya Henderson CountyGrand Jury after Gun Bar-rel City Officer Jesse Isonperformed atraffic stop onHaskins’ vehicle in Sep-tember of 2011. OfficerIson obtained consent tosearch Haskins’ vehicleand located several TexasDepartment of PublicSafety ID Cards that hadbeen tampered with to in-clude a photograph ofHaskins and other indi-viduals’ names and infor-mation, includingbirthdates and addresses.Officer Ison also lo-cated more than 50 blankchecks containing differentbank account informationfor numerous individuals.These individuals werefound to be living in Chero-kee County where theirchecks and identifying in-formation had been origi-nally stolen.Haskins has extensivecriminal history includingdrug and gun possessionconvictions. Haskins alsohas Fraud charges pend-ing in Rusk County.District Attorney ScottMcKee credited the hardwork of the Gun BarrelCity Police Department inCity goes afterstreets grantBy Lace DonagheContributing WriterSEVEN POINTS-TheSeven Points City Councilagreed to apply for a grantthat would help fundmuch-needed road workThursday.The Texas CommunityDevelopment Programgrant application is tar-geted to Quiram Lane, totear it up and rebuild theover a mile-long stretch toany specifications the citymay request.The grant program isadministered by the U.S.Department of Agriculture.Quiram connects StateHighway 274 to F arm-to-Market 85, and has beenin disrepair for a lengthyperiod of time. It carriesquite abit of traffic, includ-ing school buses, the coun-cil heard.If awarded, the granttotals $275,000, with a$20,000 match from thecity. Council membersagreed that if the city wonthe grant application, thecity would save the re-quired $20,000.Drugstated: “This is a casewhere Deputy (Kenny)Collard followed his in-stincts. He was as persis-tent as the law allowed andthat persistence is the rea-son that over 80 grams ofmeth are off of the streetsof Henderson County.We will always aggres-sively prosecute peoplelike Thomas who was poi-soning our community withlarge quantities of narcot-ics.”Thomas was a passen-ger in a vehicle that waspulled over late into thenight on Nov. 30 of lastyear. Collard of the Hend-erson County Sheriff’s of-fice initiated the traffic stopbecause he noticed a de-fective head lamp. Uponapproaching the vehicle,Col l ard detected the odorof marijuana. Thomas andthe driver were asked tostep out of the vehicle andDAVID ALLEN THOMASas Thomas exited, thedeputy saw Thomas throwsomething into some tallgrass by the roadside.During a search of thevehicle, Collard discov-ered a Mary Kay bag con-taining multiple small bags,digital scales, a pipe and alarge gallon-sized plasticbag with just over 80 gramsof methamphetamine.I—LFClL Ll i£ks LlLLlC.wmMICHAEL SHANEHASKINSlocating and confiscating allthe victims’ financial andidentifying information sothat it could be returned tothem. “Identity theftcrimes are extremelyharmful to the victims andthe arrest and prosecutionof the criminals who per-petrate these crimes is atop priority for my office.”IGuiltyContinued from Page 1AThe grant competition isnationwide, and SevenPoints will be consideredin 2013-14 contest year.In other business, CityCouncil members:• granted a building andsetback variance for TonyHarrison’s business,Tony’s Auto Sales, off ofSH 334, as recommendedby the Planning and Zon-ing Commission. To allowmore space for vehicles,his building will be alloweda reduced boundary set-back on the back and sideof the property to five feet.The building will be usedas a workshop for the autosales shop, with a drivewayoff the highway to accom-modate this shop.• re-appointed JeanieHulsey, Mac McKinseyand Jay Patel to anotherterm on the Economic De-velopment Corporationboard.• amended Zoning Or-dinance 272 restoring themore restrictive B-3 to amore accommodating B-2designation under Section2 of Chapter 10 of theCode of Ordinances.Continued from Page 1Ainvestigator MonteMansfield were called toChaney’s Tobacco andCheck Cashing Expressabout a possible forgedcheck someone was tryingto pass. When officersarrived they made contactwith the owner, who ad-vised the check was coun-terfeit.The owner had also con-tacted the bank listed onthe check and verified thatthe account number on thecheck had been altered.The check had been madeout to Leon Peavy, whowas still at the scene.Peavy was arrested forForgery, which is a StateJail Felony.During a search of hisvehicle, parked outside thebusiness, officers locatedadditional items of identi-fying information belongingto seven other individuals.These items includedchecks with bank accountand routing information,driver’s license numbersand social security cards.Officers also found a boxcontaining a check starterkit, containing blank checkpaper in various sizes.Peavy was then chargedwith Fraudulent Use orPossession of IdentifyingInformation, a third degreefelony.Peavy was also indictedfor and pleaded guilty to aFailure to Appear chargefor felony cases uponwhich he had been in-dicted.EAST TEXASHOMES& FARMSAdvertisingResidential,Farms, Ranches,Acreage,Commercial, LakeProperties andMore!The BestSource forReachingBuyers:Circulation10,000Distributed in14 CountiesREG. 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